The Fragments of September
by dancingbarefoot
Summary: Sometimes the choice isn't yours anymore. Sometimes it never was. All the signs were there,and the lesson came too late. Alice never visits,but Edward does. Canon divergent;after New Moon.


The fact that you'd ever had a choice in this had been an illusion.

That you'd been afforded such an illusion had been a courtesy .

Manners were important after all.

Nothing had ever been on your terms,not really.

If you had to remember a time when he'd accepted no for an answer,at that moment you certainly could not.

_(what about the time in the woods you said no then when you begged no no please come back come back come back)_

You try to shake the memory away,but think better of it.

_(that's right remember...remember it all look at his face his lying eyes)_

he'd told you in the beginning how you couldn't be friends;_shouldn'_t be friends,

yet there he'd been _AGAIN ;talking to the top of your head as you were walking away._

...away from him like he'd wanted.

_(Jesus Christ what do you want)_

Remember how he'd stalked you from a distance;skillfully so.

You'd had no idea.

He'd simply been there in the nick of time ,to save you that first time...

_(saved me saved me for himself)_

It had been so romantic then,all of it had.

You were never aware of him as you lay in your bed,prone and exhausted,

coveting the sleep that eluded you ,while he coveted you from the rocking chair in the corner.

For one hundred nights,maybe more,

your mother had sat in that chair in the early hours,rocking as she fed you.

How many nights had he sat there contemplating you...and the possibilities of how you'd taste.

...a paradox of nurturing and murder, that chair was now.

The glass of a window pane is a facile barrier

and its second story placement is merely a gesture,

or so it would seem to the uninvited, anyway.

( see you upstairs Bella race you)

(_Edward how did you get up here)_

(you left your window open my love)

How many nights had he watched you sleep,obscured by shadows,soundless as the death he was?

_(with his angel's face the angel of death Oh my God)_

The hair on your arm is raised at the thought

_(you've thought this before admit it)_

(Do you get it now?)

How many times had you heard that,and not only from Jacob,either.

How embarrassing,you're a fool to so many.

That should have been the first clue,when he'd told you that he waited for no invitation.

He'd come because he'd wanted to.

_Make no mistake_, he'd left for the same reason.

He'd said all the right things,same as in the beginning.

It had been so easy with you.

He'd said he couldn't read your mind,but he'd had no trouble reading you.

He'd had decades to learn the language,and you're the oldest story in the world.

_(Please God open the door and shove me out)_

How many times had you said this prayer?

In your seconds of clarity,you knew that this would never work out

- _could never work out._

And you didn't really want to die,did you...

…...,No, not really.

You just didn't want to hurt anymore

_(Please God take this pain away I don't know what to do I don't know what to do please tell me what to do)_

_(say no you don't have to mean it you'll mean it later just say it say no)_

"No Edward,get out!I don't want you here; I don't want you back .

_(there I said it)_

We never should have started this...I never should have talked to you in the first place.

I begged you...I begged you not to go, and you let me run after you!"

_(EDWARD WAAAIIIITTT...)_

He had known you'd run after him, too.

He'd been high in a tree as you'd lurched in the dark...

walking in circles...around and around...

_(EDWARD...)_

_(((ragged breathless sobs)))_

When he'd smelled the wolves, and they

had probably smelled him too, he was gone.

There it was, the crooked smile that had once been so appealing.

When you look at him now, you see what is there

... _had been there all along._

The humorless curl of a dangerous mouth.

"Tell me you don't love me," he begins,"Never mind,I don't believe you."

It is then you take a step back, away from him.

"It doesn't matter, " you hear yourself say, from somewhere outside of your body

hovering close by.

"It never did." said this long dead boy.

_(where are you Edward.._ I'm right here ,love)

You couldn't really call him a stranger, when you'd actually met this boy before.

There was nothing to be gained by lying anymore.

"Tell me why you would make such a show

of never coming back, if you were only gonna show up in my room

when you felt like it anyway?

Why would you wanna fuck with me this way?"

"I lied."

Another truism.

Just like that ,those two words encompassed your relationship in its entirety.

(all they do is lie Bella this is what they do...please believe me little girl..)

_(I love you Uncle Bill)_

Coldness settles over your scalp and creeps slowly downward..

_(Daddy can we go see Jacob))_

Panic is strangling you, making your mouth like paper.

Powdery spit makes a halo around your

words now,

and his once addictive sweetness mingles with another scent inside your nose

...the chemical reaction of knowing that you'd been wrong.

In September,

you hadn't known which part of it had been real ,after all..

...maybe some of it...possibly none of it.

You didn't know the answer...

not even after months of festering in different combinations of the same ugly clothes, lovingly paid for

by your father, who'd watched them growing looser and emptier with every passing week...

You didn't know the answer,

…as your hair grew dirty and shapeless with neglect,

or as your breath became redolent with your despair.

_(the panic dreams the months of sleepwalking through the halls...behind the wheel..kill me._

_.I'm so tired..day after day of nothing.._

_until the warmth came..the months of Jacob the time of wolves)_

And when the signs of truth were everywhere

you flew away from the cliff;hurtling through time and space so you could hear his voice

_just one more time ._

_ ( Can you see me Edward I'm flying)_

The answer was inside you

(J_acob)_

It was in the tears in Charlie's eyes

_(Don't cry Daddy I'm not really dead_)

_(Bells honey please wake up I don't know what to do...Goddamn you Renee)_

(_It's my birthday I am 7 years old...Daddy I'm so sorry)_

It was in the house that was not-really-red-anymore,twenty three miles away.

(Bells I miss you...when are you coming back...D_addy can we go see Jacob)_

_(I love you Uncle Bill)_

If Edward hadn't really known you,how could he have loved you?

How could he love you now...

..this minute..

standing in your little room;the paint on the walls as faded as your father's patience...

watching you with eyes every bit the bottomless black as the death he was?

Well he couldn't, could he...so he didn't, did he?

Not really..

(((_not really not really__))_

_(his eyes are black his lying eyes Oh God please God _

_Jacob Jacob come back I promise I'll be good)_

(Do you get it now?)

...You hear the words inside your head in Jacob's voice, as clearly as if he'd been in this room with you;

with his ragged hair and dirty feet,lying on this pretty purple bedspread...

(_you like purple don't you_..._purple's coo_l)...

..

..but he wasn't,and that was your fault too.

JJLGREENE

7/2012

Entertainment purposes only;all characters and their universe belonging to Stephanie Meyer.

I have made no money nor received any compensation for this work.


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